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distant realm; yet in my sadness I am colder than your stones,

more alone than in a desolate place. She that dwells within you

holds my love. I long for her shadow or the sound of her step.

I am more wretchedly in love than ever--I, an impotent, invisible

spirit. Must I bear this sorrow in addition to my others, in my

fruitless search for rest? My life will be a waking nightmare,

most bitter irony of fate."

The trees swayed above his head, and the moon, in its last

quarter, looked dreamily at him.

"Ah," thought Ayrault, "could I but sleep and be happy!

Drowsiness and weariness, fatigue's grasp is on me; or may

Sylvia's nearness soothe, as her voice has brought me calm!

Quiet I may some day enjoy, but slumber again, never! I see that

souls in hades must ever have their misdeeds before them. Happy

man in this world, the repentant's sins are forgiven! You lose

your care in sleep. Somnolence and drowsiness--balm of aching

hearts, angels of mercy! Mortals, how blessed! until you die,

God sends you this rest. When I recall summer evenings with

Sylvia, while gentle zephyrs fanned our brows, I would change

Pope's famous line to 'Man never is, but always HAS BEEN

blessed.'"

A clock in a church-steeple now struck three, the sound ringing

through the still night air.

"It will soon be time for ghosts to go," thought Ayrault. "I

must not haunt her dwelling."

There was a light in Sylvia's study, and Ayrault remained

meditatively gazing at it.

"Happy lamp," he thought, "to shed your light on one so fair!

She can see you, and you shine, for her. You are better off than

I. Would that her soul might shine for me, as your light shines

for her! The light of my life has departed. O that the darkness

were complete! I am dead," his thoughts ran on, and when the

privilege-- bitter word!--that permits me to remain here has

expired, I must doubtless return to Saturn, and there in

purgatory work out my probation. But what comfort is it that a

few centuries hence I may be able to revisit my native earth?--

The flowers will bloom in the morning light,

And the lark salute the sun,

The earth will continue to roll through space,

And I may be nearer my final grace,

But Sylvia's life-thread will be spun.

"Even Sylvia's house will be a heap of ruins, or its place will

be taken by something else. If I had Sylvia, I should care for

nothing; as I have lost her, even this sight, though sweet, must

always bring regret. I wish, at all events, I might see Sylvia,

if only with these spirit-eyes, since, as a mortal, she may never

gladden my sight again."

To his surprise, he now perceived that he could see,

notwithstanding the drawn shades. Sylvia was at her

writing-desk, in a light-coloured wrapper. She sat there resting

her head on her hand, looking thoughtful but worried. Though it

was so late, she had not retired. The thrush that Ayrault had

often in life admired, and that she had for some reason brought

up-stairs, was silent and asleep.

"Happy bird!" he said, "you obtain rest and forgetfulness on

covering your head; but what wing can cover my soul? I used to

wish I might flutter towards heaven on natural wings like you,

little thrush. Now I can, indeed, outfly you. But whatever I do

I'm unhappy, and wherever I go I'm in hell. What is man in his

helpless, first spiritual state? He is but a flower, and withers

soon. Had I, like the bishop, been less blind, and obeyed my

conscience clear, I might have returned to my native earth while

Sylvia still sojourns here; and coming thus by virtue of

development, I should be able to commune with her.

"What is life?" he continued. "In the retrospect, nothing. It

seems to me already as but an infinitesimal point. Things that

engrossed me, and seemed of such moment, that overshadowed the

duty of obeying my conscience--what were they, and where? Ah,

where? They endured but a moment. Reality and evanescence--

evanescence and reality."

The light in Sylvia's room was out now, and in the east he beheld

the dawn. The ubiquitous grey which he saw at night was invaded

by streams of glorious crimson and blue that reached far up into

the sky. He gazed at the spectacle, and then once more at that

house in which his love was centred.

"Would I might be her guardian angel, to guide her in the right

and keep her from all harm! Sleep on, Sylvia. Sweet one, sleep.

Yon stars fade beside your eyes. Your thoughts and your soul are

fairer far than the east in this day's sunrise. I know what I

have lost. Ah, desolating knowledge! for I have read Sylvia's

heart, and know I was loved as truly as I loved. When Bearwarden

and Cortlandt break her the news--ah, God! will she live, and do

they yet know I am dead?"

Again came that spasm to shed spirit tears, and had he not known

it impossible he would have thought his heart must break.

The birds twittered, and the light grew, but Ayrault lay with his

face upon the ground. Finally the spirit of unrest drove him on.

He passed the barred door of his own house, through which he had

entered so often. It was unchanged, but seemed deserted. Next,

he went to the water-front, where he had left his yacht.

Invisibly and sadly he stood upon her upper deck, and gazed at

the levers, in response to his touch on which the craft had cleft

the waves, reversed, or turned like a thing of life.

"'Twas a pretty toy," he mused, "and many hours of joy have I had

as I floated through life on board of her."

As he moped along he beheld two unkempt Italians having a

piano-organ and a violin. The music was not fine, but it touched

a chord in Ayrault's breast, for he had waltzed with Sylvia to

that air, and it made his heart ache.

"Oh, the acuteness of my distress," he cried, "the utter depth of

my sorrow! Can I have no peace in death, no oblivion in the

grave? I am reminded of my blighted, hopeless love in all kinds

of unexpected ways, by unforeseen trifles. Oh, would I might,

indeed, die! May obliteration be my deliverer!"

"Poor fellows," he continued, glancing at the Italians, for he

perceived that neither of the players was happy; the pianist was

avaricious, while the violinist's natural and habitual jealousy

destroyed his peace of mind.

"Unhappiness seems the common lot," thought Ayrault. "Earth

cannot give that joy for which we sigh. Poor fellows! though you

rack my ears and distress my heart, I cannot help you now."

CHAPTER XIII.

THE PRIEST'S SERMON.

It being the first day of the week, the morning air was filled

with chimes from many steeples.

"Divine service always comforted in life," thought Ayrault,

"perchance it may do so now, when I have reached the state for

which it tried to prepare me."

Accordingly, he moved on with the throng, and soon was ascending

the heights of Morningside Park, after which, he entered the

cathedral. The priest whose voice had so often thrilled him

stood at his post in his surplice, and the choir had finished the

processional hymn. During the responses in the litany, and

between the commandments, while the congregation and the choir

sang, he heard their natural voices as of old ascending to the

vaulted roof and arrested there. He now also heard their

spiritual voices resulting from the earnestness of their prayers.

These were rung through the vaster vault of space, arousing a

spiritual echo beyond the constellations and the nebulae. The

service, which was that of the Protestant Episcopal Church,

touched him as deeply as usual, after which the rector ascended

the steps to the pulpit.

"The text, this morning," he began, "is from the eighth chapter

of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, at the eighteenth verse:

'For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not

worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.'

Let us suppose that you or I, brethren, should become a free and

disembodied spirit. A minute vein in the brain bursts, or a clot

forms in the heart. It may be a mere trifle, some unexpected

thing, yet the career in the flesh is ended, the eternal life of

the liberated spirit begun. The soul slips from earth's grasp,

as air from our fingers, and finds itself in the frigid,

boundless void of space. Yet, through some longing this soul

might rejoin us, and, though invisible, might hear the

church-bells ring, and long to recall some one of the many bright

Sunday mornings spent here on earth. Has a direful misfortune

befallen this brother, or has a slave been set free? Let us

suppose for a moment that the first has occurred. 'Vanity of

vanities,' said the old preacher. 'Calamity of calamities,' says

the new. That soul's probationary period is ended; his record,

on which he must go, is forever made. He has been in the flesh,

let us say, one, two, three or four score years; before him are

the countless aeons of eternity. He may have had a reasonably

satisfactory life, from his point of view, and been fairly

successful in stilling conscience. That still, small voice

doubtless spoke pretty sharply at first, but after a while it

rarely troubled him, and in the end it spoke not at all. He may,

in a way, have enjoyed life and the beauties of nature. He has

seen the fresh leaves come and go, but he forgot the moral, that

be himself was but a leaf, and that, as they all dropped to earth

to make more soil, his ashes must also return to the ground. But

his soul, friends and brethren, what becomes of that? Ah! it is

the study of this question that moistens our eyes with tears. No

evil man is really happy here, and what must be his suffering in

the cold, cold land of spirits? No slumber or forgetfulness can

ease his lot in hades, and after his condemnation at the last

judgment he must forever face the unsoftened realities of

eternity. No evil thing or thought can find lodgment in heaven.

If it could, heaven would not be a happy place; neither can any

man improve in the abyss of hell. As the horizon gradually

darkens, and this soul recedes from God, the time spent in the

flesh must come to seem the most infinitesimal moment, more

evanescent than the tick of a clock. It seems dreadful that for

such short misdoings a soul should suffer so long, but no man can

be saved in spite of himself. He had the opportunities--and the

knowledge of this must give a soul the most acute pang.

"In Revelation, xx, 6, we find these words, 'Blessed and holy is

he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second

death hath no power.' I have often asked myself, May not this

mean that those with a bad record in the general resurrection

after a time cease to exist, since all suffer one death at the

close of their period here?

"This is somewhat suggested by Proverbs, xii, 28,. 'In the way

of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no

death.' This might limit the everlasting damnation, so often

repeated elsewhere, to the lives of the condemned, since to them,

in a sense, it would be everlasting.

"Let us now turn to the bright picture--the soul that has

weathered the storms of life and has reached the haven of rest.

The struggles, temptations, and trials overcome, have done their

work of refining with a rapidity that could not have been

equalled in any other way, and though, perhaps, very imperfect

still, the journey is ever on. The reward is tenfold, yet in

proportion to what this soul has done, for we know that the

servant who best used his ten talents was made ruler over ten

cities, while he that increased his five talents by five received

five; and the Saviour in whom he trusted, by whose aid he made

his fight, stands ready to receive him, saying, 'Enter thou into

the joy of thy Lord.'

"As the dark, earthly background recedes, the clouds break and

the glorious light appears, the contrast heightening the

ever-unfolding and increasing delights, which are as great as the

recipients have power to enjoy, since these righteous souls

receive their rewards in proportion to the weight of the crosses

that they have borne in the right spirit. These souls are a joy

to their Creator, and are the heirs of Him in heaven. The

ceaseless, sleepless activity that must obtain in both paradise

and hades, and that must make the hearts of the godless grow

faint at the contemplation, is also a boundless promise to those

who have Him who is all in all.

"Where is now thy Saviour? where is now thy God? the unjust man

has asked in his heart when he saw his just neighbour struggling

and unsuccessful. Both the righteous and the unrighteous man are

dead. The one has found his Saviour, the other is yearly losing

God. What is the suffering of the present momentary time, eased

as it is by God's mercy and presence, compared with the glories

that await us? What would it be if our lives here were filled

with nothing else, as ye know that your labour is not vain in the

Lord? Time and eternity--the finite and the infinite. Death

was, indeed, a deliverer, and the sunset of the body is the

sunrise of the soul."

The priest held himself erect as a soldier while delivering this

sermon, making the great cathedral ring with his earnest and

solemn voice, while Ayrault, as a spirit, saw how absolutely he

meant and believed every word that he said.

Nearly all the members of the congregation were moved--some more,

some less than they appeared. After the benediction they rapidly

dispersed, carrying in their hearts the germs he had sown; but

whether these would bear fruit or wither, time alone could show.

Ayrault had noticed Sylvia's father and mother in church, but